The coal mining industry has been declining for decades in the far southwestern corner of Virginia, a trend made even worse of late due to the pandemic. The region has experienced a significant economic downturn as a result, with unemployment and poverty levels rising as no new opportunities have successfullyRead More

From the Energy News Network: Solar installers in Ameren Illinois’ territory have hit a key milestone, prompting a regulatory process with high stakes for the future of rooftop solar in the state. Illinois’ 2017 Future Energy Jobs Act calls for replacing retail net metering with a localized value-of-solar rate asRead More

A proposal in Iowa, which still needs to pass in the legislature, would preserve net metering and let utilities recoup costs faster. After years of tussling over net metering rules, Iowa solar advocates and the state’s largest utility finally found common ground recently on one core point: They all wantRead More

Ipsun Solar, a premier solar installer in Northern Virginia, has brought on Alan S. Larsen as senior adviser for governmental and legal affairs. Among his initial endeavors, Larsen will coordinate the company’s effort to advocate for improved solar policy in Virginia. “So much of the progress on energy production andRead More

Looking back at 2019, if I had to pick a pun moniker for the solar industry (and I do), it wasn’t so much a ‘solar-coaster’ as it was a ‘solar derby.’ Established companies, technologies and ideas were all bashing into each other, forming alliances and finding other competitive edges toRead More

The solar industry made South Carolina a priority this year. The state had outdated regulations that were holding back renewable energy demand. In May, state lawmakers passed a bipartisan bill that solved all of these issues. It lifted net metering caps, allowed for solar leases and much more. As partRead More

The Louisiana Public Service Commission (PSC) voted last month to lower the net metering rates energy companies must pay solar customers. The crusade to lower the value of home solar was led by Entergy, which will be decreasing its per kilowatt payback from 10 cents to 3.5 cents. This articleRead More

Net energy metering (NEM) policies have played a crucial role in making residential solar installations a good investment for homeowners in the United States. However, as installed solar capacity has increased, many utility companies have introduced changes to their NEM programs that reduce the value of distributed solar. Aurora usedRead More

The State of New York’s Public Service Commission (PSC) issued its long-awaited order updating the Value of Distributed Energy Resources (VDER) tariff, which compensates distributed energy resources, like solar, for the collective environmental and societal benefits they provide to the state’s electrical grid. “New York has set an ambitious goalRead More

Advocates are raising concerns about a proposal from Idaho Power Company that would increase utility bills and uncertainty for many businesses and farmers that want to use solar energy to meet their own electricity needs. The utility’s application to the Idaho Public Utilities Commission, which was filed Friday, seeks toRead More